


sunflowers for the dead

by voidpen



Category: Legacies (TV 2018)
Genre: Angst and Tragedy, F/F, Hanahaki Disease, Sad with a Happy Ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-26
Updated: 2019-10-26
Packaged: 2021-01-03 09:50:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,831
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21177455
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/voidpen/pseuds/voidpen
Summary: Shortly after leaving for Belgium, Penelope Park began to write letters; letters she knew she'd never send, to a girl she knew she'd never stop loving.A Hanahaki Disease AU.





	sunflowers for the dead

**Author's Note:**

> been wanting to write a one-shot for posie ever since i found out about hanahaki disease. i know other [but more talented writers] have also written about it, so i've put off reading their fics until i wrote my own. i'm not sure how close to canon this fic actually is, so i'm sticking with calling it an au just for the sake of my own sanity.
> 
> i wrote this in 7 hours. please be gentle with me.
> 
> warning: heavy on angst [my brand]. proceed at your own peril.

**01/06/2030**

Dear Josie,

My mom and I just landed in Belgium. She’s driving us across town right now, so I thought this might be a good time to write my first letter to you. I’m not really tired but I keep falling in and out of sleep and, for some reason, I was just thinking about our first kiss. I don’t know why or what brought the memory on, but I guess it just snuck up on me. I was looking out of the window at the sky and I just drifted off for a while, I think. I remembered how nervous I was when I walked up to you that day. I had something to tell you but I didn’t know how to say it. I wanted you to know but I was too afraid to tell you. I remembered what it felt like when your hands reached out to close the distance between us and pulled my body closer to yours. I saw it all play out in my mind again, and it just kept repeating like a broken record - almost like a never-ending fever dream.

I closed my eyes when our lips met for the first time; soft, tender, warm.

You wrapped your arms around my neck, moaned against my lips, and melted into me.

And all I could think when I finally opened my eyes - when I finally let you go - was that I miss you…. I miss you. And I know none of this will mean anything. I know that you’ll never read this letter. I won’t let myself put you through that - not again, no matter what happens. I will always protect you.

We just passed through a tunnel, out into a road with almost no trees in sight. You can see the sky clearly now, its color dark orange… bright red maybe. It looks like the world’s on fire. I think you would’ve liked it.

Yours,

Penelope

**13/06/2030**

Dear Josie,

I’m sorry I haven’t had the chance to write to you in a while. It’s been almost two weeks now, but I’m finally starting to get settled in here. The students at my new school are nice for the most part. They stare a lot but I guess I can’t hold that against them, can I? I’m still the mysterious outsider here. I let them stare most of the time but sometimes, when I get tired or bored of it, I smirk or wink in their general vicinity and they get so flustered they end up running in the other direction. My technique has yet to fail.

So, you know how I said earlier that I haven’t had the chance to write in a while? That might have been a lie. I tried to sit down to tell you what’s been happening to me lately but I just couldn’t find it in me to go through with it. I have at least ten crumpled pieces of paper in my trash can right now and I just know you’d give me hell for it – call me out on behalf of the trees that died for those ten unsent letters. Before you get _too_ angry though, know that the reason they’re there is that I would begin to explain my take on how everything started happening but then I’d get scared by the time I got near the ending, and I’d have to start all over again.

So, this time around, I decided to do things differently.

Plan A: Start at the beginning. Never let it get to the end.

_(I’ll leave out Plan B on account of the fact that I don’t have one)_

The first flower came out when I was in class. I was coughing quite a bit before then, but I thought I was just coming down with the flu or something of the sort. So you can imagine my surprise when a rose petal appeared in the hand I had coughed into. Ironically enough, it was yellow. Can you believe it? The universe can be a real dick sometimes.

When I went home that day, I started reading up on what had happened, trying to find something to explain why I had also managed to cough up two more petals on my way back home. Luckily, thanks to my mother’s private library, it didn’t take me long.

_“Hanahaki Disease:_

_A disease that causes its victim to cough up flower petals when they suffer from one-sided love.”_

I know what you’re thinking. Straight out of a K-pop fanfic, right? God, I still can’t believe you actually got me to read those.

Anyway, I also did a little bit of research on the flower, although, in hindsight, I really didn’t need to. I recognized it as soon as I saw the petal. It was a sunflower – your favorite. I guess it’s just my luck that you chose to love the most frustrating flower of all. I can’t blame you though, I know what it’s like. Besides, it’s the most beautiful flower I’ve seen in my life.

Yours,

Penelope

**21/06/2030**

Dear Josie,

I’m sorry I had to stop where I did last time I did this. Let’s agree to say it was for dramatic effect. _(Can’t have my reputation tarnished just yet.)_

I’ve been reading up more on the disease in my spare time when I’m not reading up on the merge _(or coughing up sunshine petals)._ It turns out, drum roll please… there’s a cure! Can you believe it? Right, I couldn’t either.

Apparently, Hanahaki Disease ends 1) when the beloved returns the victim’s feelings, or 2) when the victim dies.

<strike>I swear it just keeps getting more and more morbid</strike>. I couldn’t find anything about where the disease comes from other than some speculation that it’s believed to have originated in Japan or Korea. _(Again, the irony is not lost on me.)_

A little more research showed that the disease can also be cured through surgical removal, which I thought was very convenient if not for the fact that there was only a handful of people left on earth who could perform the surgery, or for the fact that it cost a small fortune due its “experimental” nature. <strike>Capitalism is truly a Venus Flytrap.</strike>

There’s a catch to the surgery, though. Obviously, there’s always a catch. When the infection is removed, the victim's romantic feelings for their loved one also disappear.

Some have chosen to forget and are said to have lived long, happy, oblivious lives. They were able to start again. A clean slate. They’re often referred to as “kōun'na koto”. The lucky ones.

There’s no mention of those who choose not to forget, for obvious reasons, I suppose.

Can you believe if someone were to document their experience for the world to read? Wouldn’t that be something?

Yours,

Penelope

**03/07/2030**

Dear Josie,

I wish I could say I have good news. Weeks have passed and I’m no closer to finding a cure to the merge than I was when I first started. My current situation hasn’t helped matters much either. At least, in the beginning, I was only coughing up flower petals. Now, I’m throwing up bouquets. I’d feel bad for the flowers if it didn’t make my mom smile every time I showed up at her doorstep with a few of the ones that managed to remain _(somewhat) _intact. She loves them too, Jo! All drama aside, I think you’d be pretty proud of me. I’m sprouting an unlimited supply of sunflowers and making the world a brighter place one sunflower at a time.

The only downside is, it’s getting harder to breathe nowadays. I can feel my lungs stiffening in my chest. I think the roots have wrapped themselves in there pretty tightly. Soon enough, I won’t be able to breathe at all. Death by flower suffocation… not the way I expected to go if I’m being completely honest.

It’s been over a month now, and I’ve been thinking a lot about the last time we saw each other, the last words I spoke to you, and how I almost never got the chance to say them because I was so afraid of seeing the look on your face when you heard them. I had to leave, Jo... but I also needed you to know how I felt before I did. I needed you to understand that everything I did – everything I’ve ever done; I did because I love<strike>d</strike> you. And I never expected you to say it back. I never wanted you to feel like you had to. And even now... even knowing what I know, I would never ask you to feel something you don’t. I can’t ask you to love me or put me first when you’re still struggling to do that for yourself. I used to think that maybe… _maybe_ I could love you enough for the both of us, but then I realized you deserved better than that. You deserve to look at yourself in the mirror every morning and see yourself the way everyone around you does, Josie. You deserve happiness just as much as anyone else does, if not more. You deserve to grow up, and fall in love, and have a family, and see the word, and settle down… and I hope and pray with everything inside of me that you get the chance to do it.

And for us… I don’t know. Part of me believes that maybe, if fate had been kinder to us, I’d be lying next to you in bed right now – holding you in my arms.

But another part of me thinks that maybe this is just the way things were always meant to happen. I had to leave so you could live. I just didn’t know that leaving the way I did would make my chest feel the way it does.

On the bright side, my heart’s not evil anymore, Jo. You can’t see it... But I think it’s the most beautiful it’s ever been.

Yours,

Penelope

**07/07/2030**

Dear Josie,

I know I wrote to you just a few days ago, but the days have been getting longer lately. My mom’s been in and out of town for a while - gone for days and back for a few hours… so I’ve had the house to myself for the most part and things have been pretty quiet. I miss her, but not having to hide has made all of this a lot easier on the both of us. I wouldn’t want her to have to see me like this, especially when I know she’d want to do everything in her power to fix it – to fix me… especially when I know I’d never let her.

I started wearing a surgical mask around the house to cover up the petals peeking out of my mouth in case I pass by a mirror and see my reflection by accident. I actually haven’t looked at myself in a while just because I’m not sure I’d be able to handle it. I’m also wearing sunglasses indoors now _(although that could pass as a fashion statement if you try hard enough to convince yourself)._

I finished my exams a week ago (I know it doesn’t matter in the grand scheme of things, but I couldn’t have the school call my mom and ask her why I missed all of my final exams). It was lucky that I enrolled to spend the summer in school. I had chosen to do it so I could spend Fall traveling around Europe. Although things… obviously didn’t turn out the way I had planned. I ended up taking the exams from home a week ago, and now I’m lying on the floor of my bathroom scribbling this out on a wall with the closest pen I could summon because I’m finding it hard to breathe properly and I don’t trust my legs right now.

I miss you, Josie; more than I can ever say. It kills me that I can’t tell you that. It kills me that I can’t call you right now and explain everything and tell you how much I love you... because I do.

I should go now. I don’t know how much time I have left; days, hours, minutes… it’s kind of hard to tell at this point. But I know it won’t be long now, I can feel it. At least there’s some mercy in that.

I hope you’re better, my love. I hope you’re happy.

Yours,

Penelope

**08/07/2030**

Dear Josie,

Do you remember your last birthday? Scratch that, of course, you do. But do you remember the conversation we had just outside of your bedroom? The one about the world needing both the selfish and the selfless to keep spinning? Well, I think the world stopped spinning a while ago, Jojo. So I need you to be the selfish one now, okay? I need you to promise me that you’ll try. In fact, _the fate of the whole world quite literally depends on it, Jojo! _I believe in you.

I left my mom a note explaining everything – starting with what happened to me, and ending with what’s happening to you. She’ll help Caroline find the cure. She’ll help save you and Lizzie. I know she will.

I’ve told her a lot about you over the past couple of years. She knows you as the girl with the kind eyes and the brightest smile in the world. She loves you already.

It’s almost impossible to write this down, and I can feel my heart tightening with every word I add to this wall, but I hope it’ll be a long time before we meet again.

I love you, Josie. Never forget th——

“Penelope?”

She froze. Everything in her body was working in overdrive to adjust to the adrenaline that was now coursing through her veins because of that one word, that one voice. Penelope turned to face the door of the bathroom and saw her standing there, worry so evident in her eyes that it took everything in Penelope not to push herself up and take it away.

“Josie? H-how- How are you here?” Her voice was barely audible, both the flowers and surgical mask making it almost impossible for her to speak.

“Hope and Lizzie helped me with the spell. I… I got your letters.”

“What are you talking about? I never sent you-”

“No, you didn’t.”

Josie held up the red notebook for her to see, and Penelope looked down to the floor of the bathroom to examine the pen she had used to write her last two letters with. It was the one she had infused with magic, linking it directly to the logbook she had given Josie the day that she left for Belgium.

A surge of panic washed over her. Josie was never meant to find out like this, “I-I’m sorry.”

She was beginning to spiral when she heard Josie’s voice coming closer to her, “No, hey… don’t do that. Look at me.”

Penelope looked up from the floor to find the love of her life kneeling next to her, immediately noticing how red and puffy the girl’s eyes were. Josie reached up to remove the sunglasses from Penelope’s face, hesitantly at first but with more confidence when she saw that Penelope wasn’t fighting her on it, “Hi…”

Josie’s face was mere inches from her own at this point, but all Penelope could do was breathe out a measly “hi” in response.

“Can I...?”

Josie gestured to the mask still covering Penelope’s mouth, and she began to notice her own tears clouding her vision, “I don’t want to scare you away.”

A few seconds of silence passed between them; uncertainty levels dangerously high on both ends.

Penelope wasn’t sure what to think. Her breath caught in her throat and the increasing pressure of the vines wrapped securely around her lungs made her chest constrict, but it didn’t take long for her to recognize the look in Josie’s eyes. It was as if she was searching for the perfect words to say at that moment, “I’m not going anywhere. I promise.”

She nodded slowly, keeping her eyes trained on Josie as the girl’s hands lifted the mask from her face carefully. Penelope had been expecting to be met with something akin to pity, or disgust, or fear… but was surprised to find none of those emotions were there. Instead, Josie was looking at her the same way Josie had always looked at her.

Oh.

“I understand now. The day you left, you told me that… one day, I would understand why you did everything you did. Pen… that day’s today.”

The truth came crashing down on her. Penelope thought she could feel it changing her already. Josie was there. Josie came for her. She could almost breathe again.

“Jo-”

“I love you too.”

**Author's Note:**

> hope you guys didn't hate this one-shot too much!  
[kudos and comments are highly appreciated and help keep my motivation to write going, but they're obviously not necessary so please don't feel pressured] :)
> 
> posie endgame!


End file.
